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Shark jumping

After this week, anyone who thinks this current batch of Republicans has an ounce of legitimacy left is either a rich asshole or a damn fool. That’s it. No other choices.

I just read a tweet that says … well, here it is:

[blackbirdpie id="248511397456134144"]

Seriously? So Paul Ryan lies all through his speech at the convention, Todd Akin goes on about “legitimate rape,” and now this? “Debunked and selectively edited?”

OK, so it turns out he’s only talking about the part where he said Palestinians have no interest in peace and that peace in the Middle East is impossible. Seems Mother Jones, in its initial posting of snippets of the whole little chat Mittens had with his rich friends, left out the part where he said that peace was actually possible, but only if the United States got in there and showed those Palestinians who’s boss.

But I always keep open: the idea of pushing on the Israelis to give something up to get the Palestinians to act is the worst idea in the world. We have done that time and time and time again. It does not work. So the only answer is show them strength. American strength, American resolve, and the Palestinians will some day reach the point where they want peace more than we’re trying to force peace on them. Then it’s worth having the discussion. So until then, it’s just wistful thinking.

Yeah, Mitt always keeps open that the United States will someday have another belligerent idiot president who is ready to start Armageddon.

Oh, and Anne Romney says Mitt’s remarks about the poor are taken out of context.

Audience member: For the last three years, all everybody’s been told is, “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you.” How are you going to do it, in two months before the elections, to convince everybody you’ve got to take care of yourself?

Romney: There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what. And I mean, the president starts off with 48, 49, 48 — he starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn’t connect. And he’ll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean that’s what they sell every four years. And so my job is not to worry about those people — I’ll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. What I have to do is convince the 5 to 10 percent in the center that are independents that are thoughtful, that look at voting one way or the other depending upon in some cases emotion, whether they like the guy or not, what it looks like.

Hard to figure how that’s out of context. Only people who pay no income tax vote for Obama. That’s weird. I will vote for him. I pay income tax. Then there’s the whole implication about who it is who’s dependent on the government, you know, like veterans, the elderly. And about 4,000 really rich people who don’t pay income taxes. And never mind that there are plenty of other taxes everybody pays (including actual PAYROLL TAXES, which contrary to popular belief are not the same as taxes on income).

The New York Post had some kind of headline on this about “the truth hurts.” And in a really odd sense, this is the truth. It’s the truth about how these greedy motherfuckers really feel about the rest of us. The unvarnished truth.

And just in case, Matt Drudge dredges up a 14 year old audio of Obama saying something about believing in “redistribution,” which is conservative code for dirty commie and which Mitt himself is talking about, most likely to (a) confuse the issue and (b) make more inroads with his rich friends. I don’t need to tell you that a guy like Mitt Romney really shouldn’t be talking about what somebody else said he believed in 1998.

They’re not even pretending anymore. They’ll tell ya flat out that facts don’t matter, just the lies they keep on telling, the lies that way too many keep on believing.

But have they jumped the shark this time? And more to the point, will my beloved colleagues wake up from their stupor and realize what’s been going on?